Of Love and Mr Sprinkles
by ThnksFrThMmrs87
Summary: ONE SHOT sequel to Safe Harbor. Sometimes life's milestones come around in the strangest ways.


Disclaimer—I don't own the characters of CSI: NY

Note From the Author— This story is a sequel of sorts to Safe Harbor. I will emphasize that it's a ONE SHOT. This just portrays how unusually the pivotal moments in life can come around. As protrayed in Safe Harbor, Stella and Flack's relationship evolved a bit differently, and I think that all of the key moments in that relationship are bound to come around a bit differently as well.

Swearing creatively Don Flack swung off the elevator and stomped down the hall towards Stella's apartment. He was sure the neighbors hated him about then, but he really didn't give a damn; and he was sure his appearance would be enough to keep them away if they saw him anyway. His day had been complete crap, and what he wanted more than anything was either to punch something, or to get his hands on his significant other and hope that she'd help him to forget his completely crappy day.

He reached Stella's place and slipped inside quietly. She heard the door shut and called out to him. "If you'll give me a minute we can go grab something to eat." She came around the corner and looked up. "Just give me a second and… what happened?" She hurried up to him as she took in the cuts and scrapes and bruised skin of his face and his torn and bloodied suit.

Without saying a word he pulled her into his arms and kissed her soundly. As he thought it would, having her in his arms was helping. Then a jolt of pain shot through his split lip and it all went to hell. He growled under his breath and pulled back. "If you help me into a chair I'll explain everything. Everything hurts."

"Alright." She slung and arm around his waist and led him into the living room and into a chair. "Now who or what did you lose a fight with?"

Flack Frowned. "What makes you think I lost?" he asked.

"Looked in a mirror lately?"

"Point taken; anyway, all of this…" He waved a hand. "Came from a case today."

Stella nodded. "Okay, go on."

"We got a call today from a woman saying that some guy in her building had a body in his apartment. She was so damn hysterical that she couldn't tell us anything else. Of course, we had to check it out no matter how very little she gave us."

"Of course."

He smiled, and then winced as pain coursed through his face. "Damn it."

"Hold on a minute. I'll get a first aid kit." She disappeared into the bathroom but her voice came floating back to him. "Is it just your face?"

He laughed. "Like I said, everything hurts. Places I can't even reach on my own hurt."

"Okay, I get it." She stood in front of him with one hand on her hip and the other holding the first aid kit. "Strip."

"Sweeter words were never spoken," he sighed. When her eyebrows rose he held his hands up and surrendered. "Okay, okay."

In a minute he was stripped down to a wifebeater and his suit pants and Stella set about applying antiseptic and ointment. "Keep going."

"So we get to this guys apartment and tell him there's been some reports of odd activity in his place, ask him if he minds if we take a look around. See this was where I expected him to get his panties in a twist and say no."

She looked at him curiously. "He didn't?"

Don shook his head. "No, he said sure, come on in; tells us he's suffered a personal tragedy and there's a body in the bathroom."

"Seriously?" she asked.

"Seriously. So we head for the bathroom right, and he's behind me the whole time telling me that he's so traumatized and he couldn't bear to call anyone because he wanted to do the burial himself. He'd evidently been telling everyone in the building about this death, which explained the hysterical call." He hissed when she touched a particularly nasty cut with the antiseptic.

"Sorry, but you'll regret it more if I don't take care of this now."

He nodded. "I know. So anyway, I get to the bathroom, expecting some sort of big scene or something. Only I walk in there and it's just your average bathroom. So the guy tells me that the body's in the tub, and I'm literally pulling back the shower curtain when he says something about Mr. Sprinkles."

Stella's hand stilled on his face and she grinned. "Mr. Sprinkles?"

"Oh yeah. I get the curtain open and it turns out that the body everyone's been making such a huge deal out of is a dead cat."

She burst out laughing, she just couldn't help it. "I'm sorry but Mr. Sprinkles the dead cat?"

"Imagine my surprise."

"Okay, I'm with you so far. But I'm a little unclear on how you ended up looking like twenty miles of bad road," she told him, finishing with the last cut on his face. "Is that all of the war wounds I need to take care of or do you need to lose the pants too?"

He shook his head. "I think everything on my legs and back is just bruising."

"Let me see." He leaned forward and she pulled up the back of his wifebeater to see angry bruises starting to stand out against his skin. She dropped the shirt and he leaned back. Sitting back on her heels she returned her attention to his face. "Okay, I've got to hear the rest of this story."

"It gets better. I'm leaning over the tub and all of the sudden it becomes incredibly clear that Mr. Sprinkles is not dead. Mr. Sprinkles is in fact very alive, and very pissed. Seeing as I'm the first person standing there, Mr. Sprinkles goes after me."

Shaking with laughter, Stella nodded. "Keep going."

He narrowed his eyes. "Glad you find this so amusing. So while the damn cat is latching onto me and swiping at anything he can reach, his owner is rejoicing that 'his baby' is alive. Then he gets the idea that because the cat is making these horrible noises, I'm hurting Mr. Sprinkles. So now I've got the cat ripping up my suit and my face and arms, and his owner hitting and kicking like he's in a bar fight from behind me. The hissing and yelling finally got the attention of the uniform I left at the door, and we managed to get the cat and the guy under control."

By this point she was clutching her sides, aching from laughter. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry."

Able to see a bit more of the humor in the situation with some distance, Flack managed a small smile. "Anyway, we had to take him in after he went postal on me. When I talked to him he apologized and explained that his only child had died as a teenager, and when his wife died all the family he had left was the cat."

She straightened up and her smile went soft. "You let him off didn't you?"

"Well, I decided not to press charges anyway."

"You got called out on a body that turned out to be Mr. Sprinkles the cat, a cat that turned out not to be dead and then mauled you while his owner went Fight Club on you; and you let him off. You let him off because the cat is his only family." She rose for a moment only to settle lightly in his lap. She wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him sweetly. "I really love you, you know that?"

It was as if someone hit the pause button; they both froze. They'd been together for four months, and neither of them had said the words out loud, not until that moment. Whoever had the remote pressed play again, and Flack look down at her with his blue eyes just a little bit wide. "You wanna repeat that?" he asked.

Stella nodded. "I really love you, you know that?" she said again.

"I guess I do now." His hands came to frame her face and he kissed her languidly. "I guess it's only fair to let you know that I really love you too."

Her smile was slow and satisfied, and matched Flack's perfectly. "Good thing we're all on the same page. Thank you," she told him before kissing him again.

"For what?"

"For always being there for me, even before we were together, and for showing me that there are good men out there, despite what my record previous to you would suggest."

He grinned. "I'd like to think you ended up with a pretty good man," he commented.

She nodded. "I did, and I think I'll keep you." The kissed they shared then was long and sweet. When they pulled away she tucked herself against him, pressing a kiss to his jaw as she settled in. "If it hadn't been for your encounter with Mr. Sprinkles it may have taken us even longer to get here."

"I'm sure Mr. Sprinkles will get an extra dose of catnip tonight. Either that or he'll be too worn out from his near death experience and ruining a five-hundred dollar suit to do much of anything."

"Well I'd like to think you got something better than a suit out of today."

He smiled. "Yeah, you're probably right." He winced when she smacked his chest. "Hey I'm wounded remember?"

"Not that wounded smart ass."

"You're right," he conceded. "I got something a whole lot better."


End file.
